


Come Where I Lay

by Blissfully_Different



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: (I didn't really try at all), Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, I tried to go light on the bromance, Mentions of past drug use, Platonic Life Partners, Post-Acute Withdrawal Syndrome, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-25
Updated: 2014-04-25
Packaged: 2018-01-20 17:49:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1519715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blissfully_Different/pseuds/Blissfully_Different
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I do hope you know that I am... appreciative of your patience, regarding this issue. A lesser man would have left having intimate knowledge of my... past and present demons.” </p>
<p>John looked up at him with all the deep seated sadness of a man who'd watched everyone he'd ever loved struggle with something he could only stand at the periphery of. “A saner man, perhaps,” John said, managing to twist his lips into a smirk. “Possibly a more squeamish man, but to be fair, if the kitchen table autopsies didn't scare me away, it was rather a sure bet that I could take a few 3 AM drugs busts.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come Where I Lay

John was abruptly awoken by the warbling noise of a heavy plastic bowl hitting the floor. He'd slept in war zones, slept standing up in the gent's toilet at Scotland Yard, slept in a pup-tent with three other snoring men, one of which was undergoing a course of anti-malaria medications and kept hallucinating that insurgents were attacking. All said and done, it was Sherlock Holmes who'd managed to cross into his radar. 

To be perfectly fair, it wasn't every noise the detective made that woke him up. He'd have been admitted to a psych ward by day 10 of living with him if that were the case. In fact, John found his best sleep on the nights when Sherlock deigned to play something soft and hollow sounding (he would willingly admit that in 2 years his knowledge of classical music had improved little more than his deductive abilities.)

However, as the sound of the bowl being kicked about the kitchen hit his eardrums, he was already sliding his toes into a pair of ratty slippers he'd received as a birthday present from Harry after his discharge and trudging towards the stairs. The mild scent of tobacco met him at the top of the stairs. By the time he'd made it to the second floor landing, he was practically choking on it. “Out,” he snapped as the door swung open. 

Sherlock flicked the butt out the window the moment John stepped through the door, crossing his arms and looking up moodily as John crossed into the kitchen to flick on the kettle, going about his tea routine by rote, still half asleep. The two said nothing, the silence thick, yet comfortable and reminding John of the duvet he'd neglected to grab from his bedroom. The flat was a bit chilly, but neither of them could be arsed to light the fire, even given how restless Sherlock currently was. John watched him pace before looking away, discomforted by the frenetic energy Sherlock was giving off as he tugged at his hair. 

John set the mugs of tea on the coffee table, snatching up the Sudoku cube off the desk, twisting it up and tossing it absently to Sherlock who caught it without looking. John wondered if this routine was becoming too familiar, that it might be losing its potency, but John could think of nothing else that might be more effective. 

John slumped on the sofa with his tea, propping his ankles up on the coffee table and turning on the telly just in time for an episode of QI to end and another to begin. He didn't look up when the heavy weight settled in his lap, simply taking up his post as Sherlock Holmes' personal brain massuer. 

For a solid hour John watched bad reruns while sliding his fingers loosely through Sherlock's hair, scratching his scalp and twirling the strands of hair lightly around his fingers until it was a fluffy frizzy mess while the detective played with his puzzle, solving it and handing it to John to twist and rearrange only to hand it back to him. It hurt John's brain a bit even to contemplate how brilliant Sherlock must be to solve such a difficult puzzle in so little time when it took John a good seven minutes to finish the standard version where it took Sherlock three to twist the cube into mathematical perfection. 

Which must have made it all the worse, really, during moments like these. John couldn't understand his friend's situation, but he could sure as hell see it in the line of Sherlock's body, the tightness of his jaw, the pained expression on his face and the scrabbling of his fingers. 

Eight months ago, in the usual Sherlock fashion, the detective had scrapped his arm on a rusty nail, neglecting to inform John of this occurrence until three days later. John had phoned up Mycroft, insisting on an up-to-date medical history for his brother and gotten a bit more than he'd bargained for when it was couriered over forty-five minutes later. Luckily Sherlock had gotten a jab three years previous after he'd fallen off a fire escape into a skip and wasn't at any risk of developing tetanus. However John couldn't unread the rest of his file. 

He'd been alarmed but not wholly surprised by some of the injures Sherlock had sustained. Stabbings, being thrown out of a window, a broken tailbone after being thrown from a horse when he was 12. (“When were you planning to mention you had your gallbladder out?”) However, what had really given John pause were the notes from the rehab centre Sherlock had spent three months in four years previous and from the hospital at that time. That Sherlock had spent the good part of two years in the throes of a bad heroin addiction. He'd developed Post-Acute Withdrawal Syndrome and had spent three months unable to care for himself. 

“Sherlock,” John had said quietly, putting a hand on his flatmate's shoulder and having it abruptly shrugged off. “You tried to-?”

“I didn't try to kill myself,” Sherlock all but snarled, rearing back like a miffed cat, just waiting for John to make an advance so he could claw his eyes out. “I didn't! It was... too white in there,” he muttered, pacing furiously. “I wanted to see colour again.” 

John had swallowed, shutting the file and wishing he could delete it the way Sherlock was capable of. Because it made sense, in odd ways. The mood swings, the days the detective could spend staring into space and conversely, the hours he'd spend in destructive mania. Yes, there was likely a precedent to this, but John couldn't help but wonder how much of it was exacerbated by the cravings.

“It's always the same dream,” Sherlock had admit to John's leg in the early morning hours of a drizzly Sunday that first time John had recognised the signs. “One of Mycroft's cars trailing me and I'm desperate to find somewhere, anywhere out of his sights to use. I get the tie on and I find a vein and I'm just about to press down on the plunger when I wake up.” There was absolutely nothing John could use to compare to how miserable an experience that must be, but he'd taken Sherlock's hand and given it a firm squeeze, stayed up with him for another two hours until his breathing had evened out and then shuffled him off to bed. 

For a little while, John considered breaking the silence between them. He weighed the wisdom of letting the younger man know he was allowed to wake John up. Could come into John's room, or even text him, but there was no real point. John had quickly developed a sixth sense for knowing when the man was going stir crazy. He was never subtle about making his wishes known. “Trust me,” John had told him when he'd first beckoned him to lie down with one of his science subscriptions, his feet propped up on John's lap while the doctor had pretended not to give any notice of what his hands were up to as they circled a small scar on his ankle and traced along his tarsals and metatarsals, eventually even his phalanges.

“What's the tattoo on your ankle mean?” John had asked over brunch the next day, having been puzzling all night over the four black lines that had been inked into the skin over Sherlock's anklebone.

Sherlock had merely flipped to the obituaries, handing John the rest of the newspaper and carried on ignoring his food as though John had said nothing at all. The next time the doctor was awoken to the banging of a chair being kicked over repeatedly, he hadn't had to call Sherlock over, merely raised up his own laptop, willingly giving it over, and was greeted with his friend's head in his lap. 

\--

It was nearly four in the morning when John stumbled home, having braved the remnants of the first blizzard London had yet seen. He shivered all the way up the steps, losing shoes and layers all over the place and making a beeline for the shower. 

He was still trembling from a bone deep chill even five minutes of hot water couldn't thaw and made a small growling noise in his throat when his dressing gown wasn't on the hook where he'd left it. He briefly eyed the red silk robe that was hanging in its place but decided against it. What he needed now was heat, not coverage, and while Sherlock's dressing gowns were brilliant for flouncing around in and allowing his flatmate to achieve ostentatious displays of stroppiness, they weren't much for warmth. So he took the stairs quickly with a towel round his hips and threw open the door, rearing back when he caught sight of the detective snuggled up warmly in John's bed. 

John blinked, licked his lips, then blinked again, not fully allowed the time to process this development as he was reminded of how cold he truly was. “Fuck sakes,” he muttered, shooting over to his dresser to find something warm to change into. He was perplexed into letting out a strangled sneeze, managing to catch it in the towel before he could propel snot everywhere. He dropped the terry cloth, digging in his top drawer for a pair of pants and freezing when he heard a bit of rustling behind him. 

A brief sniff, and then a soft “well, hello,” as Sherlock announced himself awake. Trust the detective to wake up in the 30 seconds John would be naked for.

“You always did have remarkable timing, you prat,” John told him, climbing into a pair of green boxer-briefs and then stalking over to the bed to climb beneath the covers, too cold to worry over propriety. “What are you doing in my bed and is that my bloody robe?” he asked once Sherlock had sat up. 

John glanced at him, expecting the customary response of sarcasm or haughty contempt, but instead Sherlock seemed to sink back down under the duvet, seeming to consider his response. “I was under the belief I would be finished using it before you returned and it wouldn't be an issue,” he admit. “I hadn't foreseen the possibility of cats.” 

“Cats?” John asked before he could process it all properly. He was distractedly spent, cold and perplexed.

“Obviously the reason you didn't spend the night with the woman you provided three orgasms to and then promptly abandoned. You're far too polite to leave for any other reason than a genuine health concern, and she's either not keen on cleaning or has too many for you to feel comfortable falling asleep around. You were right to leave when you did. You'd have woken up with your eyes swollen shut and that's not a particularly pleasant sight to awaken to,” Sherlock answered. 

“As opposed to the sight you just woke up to,” John chuckled and could practically hear Sherlock's eye roll.

“You've never fluctuated more than 3 pounds in all the time I've known you. You're a perfectly standard male human being. Apart from the quarter moon shaped birthmark on your upper thigh, you look no different naked from behind than any other man your age,” Sherlock provided and John spent nearly five seconds trying to work out if that were a compliment.

“Okay,” John settled for answering, drifting off into silence as he considered asking the question 'what are you doing in my bed?' again before Sherlock answered it himself, turning onto his side facing John and looking up at him bashfully, somehow managing to look about 12 years old under the incandescent street lighting of John's bedroom. 

“You weren't... here,” Sherlock told him, and the slight pause in his voice told John everything that he needed to know. He nodded instantly, turning towards Sherlock and pulling the covers up further over his shoulders. 

“Could of called,” John murmured as he turned onto his back, their shoulders brushing. “You know I'd of come.” 

Not without a bit of grumbling first, though. Sherlock never would have come out and said what he really needed. More likely he would have come up with some paper thin excuse for the doctor to return to the flat. Identify an appendectomy scar from a fifteen year old cold case photo. Listen while Sherlock explained how he'd known that an old rival of his from Cambridge had spent 25 million dollars on a fraudulent Jackson Pollock painting. Help Sherlock test out a new ultra-thin body armour he'd been developing by punching him in the stomach (ineffective, John had nearly thrown up upon seeing the colour drain out of Sherlock's face). 

Sherlock shrugged. “You asked me back in February to give you one day off per month. It had been nearly two,” he said quietly, his voice beginning to fade with fatigue. 

“You know that's not my top priority,” John admit. “Let's just go to sleep, mate, it's not important,” John declared, sensing they were both stretching their limits. He turned on his side to face the other way and heard Sherlock sit up. John didn't bother even turning around, simply reaching behind him to catch Sherlock's arm and pulling it until the man had no leverage to keep himself upright, falling onto his back with a muffled chuckle. 

“M'kay,” Sherlock responded, turning onto his side and pressing backwards until their shoulder blades were pressed right up against each other. John was hyper-aware of the contact for all of half a minute before he slumped back against his friend, curling around a pillow and burying his nose in it. 

It wouldn't be the first or last time they'd shared a bed, or had even fallen asleep together. That happened often enough on trains that they'd even worked out the best position for them both to lie against one another to prevent their necks from getting a crick in them. Sherlock was a very still, very deep sleeper yet every time John had fallen asleep beside him, their backs to one another, he'd awoken to the detective curled up against his back, his arms wrapped around his own chest and his forehead pressed up between John's shoulder blades. It had been horribly strange the first time he'd awoken to it, before slowly becoming a great comfort and oddly flattering to the doctor. There wasn't another person Sherlock would have dared do this with, and John could forgo what Sherlock referred to as his 'defensive heterosexuality' to allow himself to feel honoured by it. 

In actual fact, John was rather certain it was the most human thing he'd ever witnessed Sherlock doing, and he always had to bite back a smile to know that the icy cool, always levelheaded, brilliant detective enjoyed a bit of a cuddle every now and again. It was with that thought, as well as the pull of his body toward Sherlock's body heat that he flipped over and threw an arm over the detective's chest, pressing close and chuckling at the whine he felt more than heard at having his heat stolen. Sherlock didn't move away though, and it wasn't long before they were both lost to their fatigue.

–

“You've been in there for two hours, Sherlock. At least give me a sign that you're still conscious,” John grumbled at the bathroom door, sucking in a breath and counting to ten. When no answer was forthcoming he jiggled the handle and then went to find Sherlock's lock picking kit. The detective might have been a master at even the most complex padlocks, but John could manage a standard bathroom lock with a hairpin in a pinch. 

Once he heard the lock click, he braced himself for whatever might be on the other side of the door. He had a brief moment of internal reflection once he'd sighed his relief at finding his nude flatmate asleep in the tub. He stood there, his arms crossed, trying to work out the most courteous technique for waking the younger man when his eyes caught on the bandage on Sherlock's ankle. It took him a few moments before he remembered it was in the exact spot he'd seen the lines inked onto his skin.

John forgot propriety altogether, curiosity getting the better of him. He lifted Sherlock's foot from the water and easily peeled back the soggy tape. The four lines now had a diagonal slash through them. His eyebrows knotted and he jumped a mile as the baritone rumbling interrupted his musings.

“Would you mind handing me a towel, John?”

“Christ,” John muttered, clutching at his heart before standing up and snatching up the towel on the toilet seat. “Sorry, but you're really not meant to get them wet this soon,” he remarked, turning away under the guise of giving Sherlock his privacy, but more to give himself some as his cheeks were abruptly heating. 

“I had had it propped up. It must have slipped in when I fell asleep,” Sherlock told him calmly, as though finding his flatmate examining his ankle while he was in the tub was a normal occurrence. John felt a strong current of disorientation as he recognised how strange all of this was not. John moved out of the way as Sherlock, still dripping, lifted his foot to the toilet seat and patted the fresh tattoo dry. 

“Five,” John muttered, giving his own deductive abilities a whirl as he searched the medicine cabinet for lotion. “Five... years?” 

“Obviously,” Sherlock murmured, taking the tube John handed him and rubbing a bit into his skin. 

“So it's... an anniversary?” 

“Yes,” Sherlock told him, obviously holding back the snippy remark he'd have preferred were it anyone but John. 

“It's... July 3rd. July 3rd,” he repeated to himself, trying to work out the significance as he found a new bandage and some medical tape, slapping Sherlock's hand away as he tried to apply it himself. 

“It's not a date relevant to you, obviously. We've only known each other 3 years. Lacking an eidetic memory, you'd have no reason to retain that date at all. It's private,” Sherlock told him bluntly and John snorted, and then giggled as he taped the bandage into place, kneeling beside him.

“What?” 

“It's... nothing. Just, I find it amusing to be discussing boundaries with my face half a meter from your bits,” John joked, gathering the supplies and putting them back in the cabinet.   
Sherlock cleared his throat, but didn't bother to cover himself up, never one for the theatrics of modesty. “Have you ever had a tattoo removed, John? Oh, of course, that wasn't a birthmark, was it? Always hard to tell in the dark. You used one of those cheap creams and didn't bother to follow through with it. What was it, then? A name?”

“Quid pro quo, Clarice.” 

“That's not the line,” Sherlock muttered, his ears going a bit pink as John smirked at him. Of course Sherlock had adored Silence of the Lambs, and would deny it until the day he died. He took the opportunity to cover his face under the guise of drying his only slightly damp hair. 

Sucking in a breath, Sherlock pushed into his bedroom and John trailed after him once he'd begun speaking.

“As you saw for yourself, I had it done directly over the medial malleous of my right ankle. Certainly not the most painful spot to receive a tattoo, but an entirely unpleasant process. It's... a subtle reminder of pain. A perceived permanence, and a warning to myself of what awaits me should I ever again bow to my nucleus accumbens,” Sherlock told him with as much dignity as he could convey while pulling a pair of black boxers up over his scrawny arse. 

“So July 3rd was...” 

“The last time I used heroin, yes,” Sherlock clarified, running a comb through his hair and glancing at John in the mirror. 

John shifted slightly, staring down at his own feet. He thought of his sister, constantly fluxuating between self-righteous sobriety and pickling her liver. He thought of them dragging their unconscious mother up the stairs, his hands under her armpits, Harry holding up her legs. Of his father ultimately having her institutionalised and her eventual departure from his life. The Christmas cards he'd stopped getting from her once he'd enlisted. 

When he finally looked up, Sherlock was dressed, staring at him as though facing down the firing squad, head cocked to the side the way it was when he was feeling particularly vulnerable. “I do hope you know that I am... appreciative of your patience, regarding this issue. A lesser man would have left having intimate knowledge of my... past and present demons.” 

John looked up at him with all the deep seated sadness of a man who'd watched everyone he'd ever loved struggle with something he could only stand at the periphery of. “A saner man, perhaps,” John said, managing to twist his lips into a smirk. “Possibly a more squeamish man, but to be fair, if the kitchen table autopsies didn't scare me away, it was rather a sure bet that I could take a few 3 AM drugs busts.” 

He stepped closer as Sherlock looked away in a rare moment of bashfulness. “Oi,” John said, stepping forward and clasping a hand round his flatmate's neck, tilting his head up to look at him intensely. “I wouldn't have you any other way, Sherlock. I wouldn't change a thing, not even your worst habit, you hear me?” 

It was an odd expression he was met with when the detective looked up. It was as though the urge to believe John and the compulsion to throw his words away were warring. “You complain constantly over my habits,” Sherlock reminded him.

“Yeah, and you mock all of my jumpers, but you're constantly filching them to wear to bed at night, hmm?” John reminded him. “I may whinge over how insane you drive me, but I think we both know that ship sailed ages ago.” John joked, squeezing Sherlock's neck before pulling away. “And so as not to prolong this love-fest any more than necessary, I'll just say what it is I mean and be done with it. I am constantly awed by you, mate. And not because you're a genius. Your brother's smarter than you are and I'd compliment Anderson's intelligence before I complimented his. Frankly, I'm proud of you, even if I have no right to be. You're the strongest man I've ever known, and I'd stand by your side even if you did relapse.” 

“Don't say that,” Sherlock told him, looking away, his jaw clenching.

“Well don't get me wrong, I'd never forgive you for it, and I'd probably have to stop myself from knocking your fucking teeth out, but I wouldn't hate you for it. And I don't think any of this makes you weak.” 

“Yes it does,” Sherlock bit out, digging through his drawer and upsetting his sock index in the process. “And don't try and tell me otherwise, you're a horrible liar.” 

John stepped closer, butting his shoulder against Sherlock's to push him out of the way so he could tidy the drawer Sherlock inexplicably had in near obsessive compulsive order. “Yeah, I am. So tell me, am I lying to you?” he asked, turning so Sherlock could watch his face. “I don't think you're weak. I don't think it makes you weak. In fact, I think it's one of the strongest things I've ever seen someone do, and I would never fault you for needing help getting through it.”

Sherlock looked down at him, ashen and uncertain. Touched, John worked out after a moment. “I don't like you seeing me like that,” he said admit lowly. “But knowing you know; that you would stop me if I were to try to... it helps, John.” 

“You're supposed to be a genius,” John said gently, pride laced with remarkable sadness tinting his voice. “So why haven't you figured out yet that letting yourself be vulnerable, opening yourself up like that...? It's what makes you the strongest and greatest man I've ever known, Sherlock. I'm bloody honoured you trust me to see that.” He cuffed his cheek softly with the back of his hand, pausing and meeting the intensely poignant stare before breaking away. 

“Now do we need a hug here, or do you think we're all set?” 

Sherlock snorted, but the expression, his lips twisting and his hands fidgeting like he had no idea what to do with them, remained. “Right, I'll get the stepladder, shall I?” John joked, moving forward to capture the younger man in his arms, feeling with no hesitancy the man's longer limbs wrap themselves around his shoulders, Sherlock's chin resting on top of his head. He'd do anything to protect this man, he realised with an uncompromised sense of certainty. “I'm not going to let you fall, love,” he whispered, nearly soft enough the other man wouldn't hear him, but he felt the squeeze, the huff of breath stirring his hair. 

“I know.”


End file.
